Constitution Day

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
-- Thomas Jefferson

Particularly in this latest election cycle, the Constitution is receiving a lot of attention. The Constitution was completed by the Delegates to the convention on September 17th 1787.

The Constitution was the result of a trade dispute between Virginia and Maryland. At issue were tolls and tariffs levied by both states on Potomac river commerce, as well as Chesapeake Bay Commerce. The parties met several time between 1784 and 1786 to discuss trade issues. Culminating in the 1786 Annapolis Convention. As a result of difficulties discovered in the Articles of Confederation, the Annapolis meeting called for a Convention in Philadelphia to make corrections to the Articles of Confederation.

There were several different positions, presented during the Philadelphia convention. The major differences were over whether the Convention had the authority to present a completely new document rather than a revision of the existing one. Ultimately enough delegates persevered through the debate and presented the document and process that are the Constitution.

To truly understand our Constitution, its operation and the rights and responsibilities of citizenship more is required than merely reading the document. As seen in the brief introduction there is a considerable background needed to understand the creation of the Constitution.

After it was ratified by the Convention and presented to the Continental Congress, it was presented for debate and ratification to the member states of the Confederation. During the ratification debate one of the finest series of essays written on the operation and intentions of the Constitution was presented to the Citizens of New York. Known to day as the Federalist Papers, they were presented over a period of several weeks. The authors originally took the pseudonym Publius. Eventually the identity of the writers was revealed. Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay had attended the Convention and taken part in the debates. Recognizing that New York was a critical, perhaps the make or break state for ratification they rose in defense of their creation, and gave us one of the critical tools for understanding the Constitution.

The anti-Federalists also took advantage of the press and presented issues and solutions to problems that they saw with the proposed constitution. The principle evidence of their work was incorporated into the Constitution and became the first ten amendments to the Constitution. We know these changes as the Bill of Rights.

In recent years several scholarly collections of Anti-Federalist literature have been made, these essays are the third important source of understanding for the Constitution. Many of the criticisms still resonate today, and are being repeated in modern language yet again.

The least talked about, but possibly most important source of information on the interpretation of the Constitution comes from the 200 plus years of rulings by the Supreme Court. A relatively naive reading of the Constitution without reference to the opinions of The Court quickly leads to confusion about how various laws, rules and principles of the Constitution work in our daily life.

Since the 1950's the Scholars of the Congressional Research Service, compile a volume of annotations to the Constitution taken from the Cases of the Supreme Court. Many of the Cases that come before the Supreme Court arise from issues where one principle of the Constitution must be balanced against another principle. Over time, some of the decisions have come to be regarded as brilliant explanations of our law. Others, which stretched the limits of the court at the time of the ruling, have been altered, extended or rejected in favor of new theories and principles.

I urge everyone with an interest in the way that our Country works to spend some time examining the Constitution, the Federalist and Anti-Federalist writings and the Opinions of the Supreme Court as applied to our current understanding of the Constitution.

Update
My purpose today is not to tell you what to think of the Constitution, but to urge you to think about it and study it.

References:

1. The Constitution of the United States of America
   
2. The Federalist Papers (Perhaps the most readable version I've seen)
   
3. The Anti-Federalist Papers (Best online Collection) (The Borden Collection Collects the Anti-Federalist works and pairs them with Federalist Papers)
   
4. The Annotated Constitution of the United States HTML hyperlinked version. Authoritative Version by GPO
   
5. The Founder's Constitution readings on the background of the Constitution
   

Note: These are references that I have used, they may not be the best possible ones, but they are certainly not the worst.

Paratus Et Potens (Ready and Able)

Since November of 1995 I've been going to a small memorial wall for the 111th Artillery and the 29th Infantry Division. Memorial Day is one of two days that I try to get to the memorial. When I can't be there I look for some other opportunity to remember and honor America's fallen heroes.

Today, I really didn't want to go. I was up at Arlington National Cemetery last month to bury a shipmate from the USS Cole. Work has been busy and I didn't feel up to going to the memorial and playing taps.

I went anyway - and once I got there and the City Parks and Memorials folks started setting up the chairs. Followed by the first couple of guys from the 29th Association, I started to see why I needed to come. Carl, the Adjutant, was grumbling about not being able to get a bugler from any of the local army bases.

The local post of the 29th Assoc. has a couple of D-Day veterans but we weren't expecting any of them to come out as they are getting on in years. Fortunately our weather was sunny, warm and dry. One of our D-day vets was able to come and he brought a photo of some of the men he served with. He closed with a story, about one of the fallen soldiers of the 111th, a LT Wilcox. In the days leading up to D-day they were on a break and the LT came over to talk to this gentleman. The LT asked him if he could go home would he. His response was LT you wouldn't even have time to blink, I would be gone that fast. The LT's response was that he wouldn't miss it for the world. He thought that it would be an awesome spectacle, something to tell the grand kids some day.

Sadly, LT Wilcox never saw the end of the day on June 6th, but men he served with did and remember him. And that for me is the key and the source of importance for Memorial Day and Veterans Day. We who remain, remember those who went and did not come home.

What got me there was a sense of obligation, I've become attached to these men who died before I was born. I was afraid that if I didn't go that there wouldn't be anyone to play taps for them. That brings me to the second man I met who made an impression on me. He was standing toward the back of the folks as they arrived for the memorial service. He stood out like a nail on a wood deck. He was wearing a Retired Chief Petty Officer cap. He had seen a note about the ceremony on the web and had come to ensure that there was a bugler on hand. We had a good bugler to bugler conversation. Finding among other things that we share a dislike for the Digital Insert, and a conviction that the worst live bugler is better than the best recorded bugler.

So while I had gone out of a sense of obligation, God had made provision for my weakness. This is the first time since I have been going to the 29th memorial that there has been another bugler there. We're going to try to get together before Veteran's Day and work out a version of Echo Taps.

Lastly my good friend Ultraguy, a much more prolific blogger than I, put up a post today about the importance of being available and willing, or if you prefer Ready and Able, to speak to others about the Christian Hope in us because of the sacrifice of Jesus. He went through much the same process that I did, and finally submitted to the leading of the Holy Spirit and acted. I'll let him tell the story, He's better at it.

for the full story see http://newine.wordpress.com/2010/05/31/rumors-of-wars-and-a-point-of-light/

It's the second half of the post but the whole thing is worth reading in my opinion.

...

As I wrote last September, the Father has seen fit to put a Muslim family from Turkey in the home next to ours as renters. I have prayed earnestly for each of them by name that Christ be revealed to them somehow.

As the vehicle for their conversion, I was thinking private dreams and visions, perhaps a flashy Damascus Road knock-down… maybe a glowing white Bible dropping out of the sky… something supernatural. He is God, after all. Why not?

Besides, who am I to suppose I’d do a good job being salt and light in a notoriously difficult, dangerous realm where I do not speak the language and have no inside knowledge. I’m a writer, not a street evangelist.

Sure, I used to do cold-calls now and then when I was in sales. I was actually OK at it. But that was long ago. It was different. It took a lot of energy. It’s not my bag now.

Thoughts of the family patriarch running out of the house, long, gleaming sharp sword in hand yelling “Allah-akhbar! Get away from my kids!” briefly crossed my mind.

In the previous post I shared how it began to dawn on me how the Father might be orchestrating events to use me despite such fantastic protestations. The kids have become part of the neighborhood scene. They love our dog and find any excuse to engage us with constant questions. They play basketball in our driveway. I’ve lent things to the dad who seems pleasant and humble. We have a relationship.

Last Sunday, as I returned from a worship service and some time alone in a micro-fast (postponing a meal a few hours can do as much to put my ravenous metabolism into spiritual ecstasy as a few days might achieve for some others) I noticed the older boy, age ~10, riding his scooter as I pulled into my driveway.

Getting out of the car, I looked around. Just as had been the case eight months ago, he was alone — highly unusual in our active, kid-filled neighborhood, especially on such a nice evening. I could tell he wanted to talk. The Spirit gently confirmed:

It’s go time; he’s ready; you’re ready; I’m beside you.

I had every reason to brush him off and go inside, but that Spirit-sense stopped me. The boy (whose name I’m leaving out on purpose) related how, at a picnic earlier that day, at a lake, he and his family had witnessed a drowning. The details were less important than his deep, dark, searching eyes fixed on mine as he recounted it.

He went on to recall how, back in Turkey, a friend of his father’s — almost an uncle to him — had also drowned. It was not hard to infer the impression that event must have made — his father’s uncharacteristic grief; the loss of a loving man in his life.

The death of a stranger had brought it all back. He had no answers.

I looked around again. We were still alone in the driveway. Highly unusual.

“You said your brother died, right?”

His words resounded in my soul like the starter’s pistol I’d been waiting for.

It’s go time; he’s ready; you’re ready; I’m beside you, came the gentle, sub-lingual whisper, again.

“Yes, he did.” I heard myself saying… “…but I know I will see him again, alive.”

He stopped scootering in circles just long enough to stare at me.

“Hunh? But how do you know that?”

I wish I could bottle up and convey the total innocence with which he said this.

“Because there was this guy, you see… You remember how I told you about Jesus before?” He nodded silently. “Well Jesus died and came back to life. He promised that if we follow him, we will too. That’s why I know I will see my brother again.”

He asked many questions after that, genuinely intrigued by the concept.

...

Oh, the kicker? He was born in the city once called Iconium (see Acts 14) — now one of the most conservative Muslim enclaves in that Muslim country. God finds a way…

Links:

If you want to show solidarity with America's fallen Heroes the Honor and Remember Flag: http://honorandremember.org/

Bugles Across America - If you need a bugler - Or if you are a bugler or want to be one: http://www.buglesacrossamerica.org/Pages/default.aspx

If you are a disable veteran or know one: http://www.dav.org/

If you served overseas in a war: http://www.vfw.org/

If you served at any time: http://www.legion.org/

Pharisees, Politics and Power

I've been reading Richard Foster's Classic "Celebration of Discipline." I had an interesting moment when I noticed the following. --
Speaking of the Pharisees --"One factor, however was central to their righteousness: externalism. Their righteousness consisted in control over externals, often including the manipulation of others."
They also had an annoying tendency to put burdens on others that they did not take up themselves.

As I read this I wondered where have I seen this before, and it occurred to me that the source of the legislative control coming from our government is not ideological but spiritual. By succumbing to the same impulse that leads us toward religious legalism, a sense that with the right laws we can curb behavior with a minimum of personal analysis and thought, also gives us laws that attempt to regulate things that resist regulation.

Jesus, had this to say about the Pharisees --
Mat 23:13-17 But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. (14) Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation. (15) Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves. (16) Woe unto you, ye blind guides, which say, Whosoever shall swear by the temple, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor! (17) Ye fools and blind: for whether is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifieth the gold?

Classics -- Hubbard's "A Message to Garcia"

1899

A Message to Garcia

By Elbert Hubbard

In all this Cuban business there is one man stands out on the horizon of my memory like Mars at perihelion. When war broke out between Spain & the United States, it was very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the Insurgents. Garcia was somewhere in the mountain vastness of Cuba- no one knew where. No mail nor telegraph message could reach him. The President must secure his cooperation, and quickly.

What to do!

Some one said to the President, "There’s a fellow by the name of Rowan will find Garcia for you, if anybody can."

Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to Garcia. How "the fellow by the name of Rowan" took the letter, sealed it up in an oil-skin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, & in three weeks came out on the other side of the Island, having traversed a hostile country on foot, and delivered his letter to Garcia, are things I have no special desire now to tell in detail.

The point I wish to make is this: McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, "Where is he at?" By the Eternal! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this and that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies: do the thing- "Carry a message to Garcia!"

General Garcia is dead now, but there are other Garcias.

No man, who has endeavored to carry out an enterprise where many hands were needed, but has been well nigh appalled at times by the imbecility of the average man- the inability or unwillingness to concentrate on a thing and do it. Slip-shod assistance, foolish inattention, dowdy indifference, & half-hearted work seem the rule; and no man succeeds, unless by hook or crook, or threat, he forces or bribes other men to assist him; or mayhap, God in His goodness performs a miracle, & sends him an Angel of Light for an assistant. You, reader, put this matter to a test: You are sitting now in your office- six clerks are within call.

Summon any one and make this request: "Please look in the encyclopedia and make a brief memorandum for me concerning the life of Correggio".

Will the clerk quietly say, "Yes, sir," and go do the task?

On your life, he will not. He will look at you out of a fishy eye and ask one or more of the following questions:

Who was he?

Which encyclopedia?

Where is the encyclopedia?

Was I hired for that?

Don’t you mean Bismarck?

What’s the matter with Charlie doing it?

Is he dead?

Is there any hurry?

Shan’t I bring you the book and let you look it up yourself?

What do you want to know for?

And I will lay you ten to one that after you have answered the questions, and explained how to find the information, and why you want it, the clerk will go off and get one of the other clerks to help him try to find Garcia- and then come back and tell you there is no such man. Of course I may lose my bet, but according to the Law of Average, I will not.

Now if you are wise you will not bother to explain to your "assistant" that Correggio is indexed under the C’s, not in the K’s, but you will smile sweetly and say, "Never mind," and go look it up yourself.

And this incapacity for independent action, this moral stupidity, this infirmity of the will, this unwillingness to cheerfully catch hold and lift, are the things that put pure Socialism so far into the future. If men will not act for themselves, what will they do when the benefit of their effort is for all? A first-mate with knotted club seems necessary; and the dread of getting "the bounce" Saturday night, holds many a worker to his place.

Advertise for a stenographer, and nine out of ten who apply, can neither spell nor punctuate- and do not think it necessary to.

Can such a one write a letter to Garcia?

"You see that bookkeeper," said the foreman to me in a large factory.

"Yes, what about him?"

"Well he’s a fine accountant, but if I’d send him up town on an errand, he might accomplish the errand all right, and on the other hand, might stop at four saloons on the way, and when he got to Main Street, would forget what he had been sent for."

Can such a man be entrusted to carry a message to Garcia?

We have recently been hearing much maudlin sympathy expressed for the "downtrodden denizen of the sweat-shop" and the "homeless wanderer searching for honest employment," & with it all often go many hard words for the men in power.

Nothing is said about the employer who grows old before his time in a vain attempt to get frowsy ne’er-do-wells to do intelligent work; and his long patient striving with "help" that does nothing but loaf when his back is turned. In every store and factory there is a constant weeding-out process going on. The employer is constantly sending away "help" that have shown their incapacity to further the interests of the business, and others are being taken on. No matter how good times are, this sorting continues, only if times are hard and work is scarce, the sorting is done finer- but out and forever out, the incompetent and unworthy go.

It is the survival of the fittest. Self-interest prompts every employer to keep the best- those who can carry a message to Garcia.

I know one man of really brilliant parts who has not the ability to manage a business of his own, and yet who is absolutely worthless to any one else, because he carries with him constantly the insane suspicion that his employer is oppressing, or intending to oppress him. He cannot give orders; and he will not receive them. Should a message be given him to take to Garcia, his answer would probably be, "Take it yourself."

Tonight this man walks the streets looking for work, the wind whistling through his threadbare coat. No one who knows him dare employ him, for he is a regular fire-brand of discontent. He is impervious to reason, and the only thing that can impress him is the toe of a thick-soled No. 9 boot.

Of course I know that one so morally deformed is no less to be pitied than a physical cripple; but in our pitying, let us drop a tear, too, for the men who are striving to carry on a great enterprise, whose working hours are not limited by the whistle, and whose hair is fast turning white through the struggle to hold in line dowdy indifference, slip-shod imbecility, and the heartless ingratitude, which, but for their enterprise, would be both hungry & homeless.

Have I put the matter too strongly? Possibly I have; but when all the world has gone a-slumming I wish to speak a word of sympathy for the man who succeeds- the man who, against great odds has directed the efforts of others, and having succeeded, finds there’s nothing in it: nothing but bare board and clothes.

I have carried a dinner pail & worked for day’s wages, and I have also been an employer of labor, and I know there is something to be said on both sides. There is no excellence, per se, in poverty; rags are no recommendation; & all employers are not rapacious and high-handed, any more than all poor men are virtuous.

My heart goes out to the man who does his work when the "boss" is away, as well as when he is at home. And the man who, when given a letter for Garcia, quietly take the missive, without asking any idiotic questions, and with no lurking intention of chucking it into the nearest sewer, or of doing aught else but deliver it, never gets "laid off," nor has to go on a strike for higher wages. Civilization is one long anxious search for just such individuals. Anything such a man asks shall be granted; his kind is so rare that no employer can afford to let him go. He is wanted in every city, town and village- in every office, shop, store and factory. The world cries out for such: he is needed, & needed badly- the man who can carry a message to Garcia.

THE END-

Forgiveness

Forgiveness is tough - as a general rule we aren't very good at it. We talk about it, we all want to be forgiven, but when it comes time to forgive others, when it is time to walk the talk, we don't do so well.

It isn't a new issue for us. There was a gentleman named Lamech mentioned in the 4th chapter of Genesis who had trouble with forgiveness as well.
Here's what he said about forgiveness - Gen 4:23-24 And Lamech said unto his wives, Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice; ye wives of Lamech, hearken unto my speech: for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt. (24) If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold.

Some years later in Roman Palestine - a young Rabi was teaching his disciples and they asked him a question about forgiveness. He gave them this answer - Mat 18:21-22 Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? (22) Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.

Otto Koenig a missionary and christian speaker, talks about this verse and notes that 490 times gets him one and one third years. Actually, it's more complicated than that we should think of it as forgiving until the offense stops.

Almost nine years ago now the issue became a very important one for me. I was a victim of a terrorist attack. I lost some friends in the attack and I still have nightmares about the attack. However, because I call myself a Christian, it was necessary for me to deal with the desire for revenge and the anger that was caused by the incident. Part of the solution, is allowing G-d to be the ruler over my life. How successful I have been at that is an open question - some days I find myself praying that the leader of the terrorists will make a profession of faith in downtown Riyad. Other days I find myself thinking of the coals of fire - Rom 12:19-21 Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. (20) Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. (21) Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.

The only way that we can do that is to role model forgiveness to world that finds the concept to be totally alien.

A Short History of Group Think

I started looking at the phenomenon of group think today. One of the sparks was a post by my good buddy Ultra Guy on his blog new wineskins. It seemed to me that a salient point in his argument was the decimation of the German Theoretical physics community during the 1920's and early 1930's as the tide of antisemitism drove some of the leading physicists out of Germany.
The term groupthink was coined in the early by William H. Whyte:

Groupthink being a coinage—and, admittedly, a loaded one—a working definition is in order. We are not talking about mere instinctive conformity—it is, after all, a perennial failing of mankind. What we are talking about is a rationalized conformity—an open, articulate philosophy which holds that group values are not only expedient but right and good as well.

Ultimately group think is about defending unexamined assumptions about things. As Galileo discovered with his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, Challenging the reigning world view can be hazardous to your life. In 2008 the Church completed the rehabilitation of Galileo Galilei a process begun some 300 years after declaring him a heretic.

In our own era state sponsored and organized group think rose to new levels in Germany and the USSR. The German version, Gleichschaltung was particularly invidious and the name in German calls forth images of a system like a Gyro compass with, repeaters dutifully following the master compass. The Soviet flavor, Lysenkoism, had devastating effects throughout Soviet Society and Science. The essential core of Lysenkoism was the doctrine that acquired traits were inheritable. While the concept was not new to Lysenko, having been epressed by such worthies as Buffon, Lamarck, and giving it a patina of respectability Aristotle.

The current manifestation of group think trumping the scientific method are the conjoined triplets of liberal elitism - The Population Bomb, The Coming Ice Age, and Anthropogenic Global Warming. In each case the operating principle is the same. All research that supports the group position is loudly proclaimed, contrary research is suppressed. In the next phase research funding is filtered through a combination of peer reviewed publications ensuring that reports match the desired outcome. Funding from all sources is then based on previous publication and probability of the research being publishable in a peer reviewed publication. In the last phase, to show even handedness, contrarian research is requested and then heavily redacted to ensure that even the dissenters support the core thesis.

The final nail in the coffin and the result that proves "Mark Twain, was right when he said; "It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so." The recently released Index of Environmental Indicators, you owe it to yourself to see just how much we know about our environment that isn't so. The 70 page report also shows the progression towards impotence of most attempts to actually do something about a problem degenerate into. That one fact alone should give hope to all the AGW deniers around the globe.

Credo

Reposting So You Don't Have to Hunt for My Position

It seems only fair that I let you know where I am coming from.

1. Politics
1. Conservative - I choose to look for the things worth retaining.
1. In my experience change for the sake of change is usually a mistake.
2. When change is required most of the time speed is a mistake.
3. No plan is so perfect that it can not be improved by discussion.
   
2. Finance - My position is that the United States should be run in the same way that individual citizens must. Our government at each level should be living within its means:
1. Restricting its operations to core functions
1. Public Safety
2. Education Standards
   
2. Maintaining the public infrastructure
1. Roads
2. Bridges
3. Sanitation
3. Constitution
1. The founders wrote it so that the average man could read, understand and follow it.
2. The founders were informed by history and understood that in the aggregate they were neither better nor worse than those who had come before them, and they had no expectation that their heirs would be any different.
2. Religion
1. Conservative
2. Protestant - Methodist
3. Evangelical -- Proclaiming the Good News
   

My Handle

Other folks have asked in the past why I picked my "handle." It is equal parts elementary school nickname, favorite Winnie the Pooh character, and general geographic locater (zip code). I came up with the handle when I first started commenting on a friend's blog. Much of the material there is related to local politics and other local issues. To the extent that I found some of the material resonating with my own local experience, I felt it necessary to indicate in some way that I was not a local, and that I didn't have a dog in the fight.

Because I distrust the relative anonymity of the web I have elected to keep a consistent persona in the blogosphere. The other thing that consistency in my handle does is make it easy for those who want to know what I really think to find my previous thoughts.